We have all seen it in the movies; the guy gets sentenced to jail…. just before he gets rammed into the back of the jail van he says “wait for me?” the door slams shut as the girl wipes a tear away from her eye.

5 minutes later she is banging the post man.

If this sounds familiar it should, because the lockout is going to slam on our teams soon and we are going to be faced with this very situation. Already Mr Magner and Mr Neale have thrown a spanner in our works. As we all know midyear trades are like gold, the dreaded 3-4 week injury is always the toughest to digest. Do I trade or do I wait? Each week as the zeros go by you are haemorrhaging cash, and by extension the chance to win that car.

But now we have unlimited trades! The decision should be easy – kick’em to the curb!

But no…. if we think about this clearly we have done all the hard yards, done all the research and come up with a list of the players we think will make us the most cash, does it really matter if they miss the first one or two weeks? What if you bring in a rookie playing round one and it ends up being Relton Roberts mk2 … or worse still Relton Roberts??

Let’s be honest, it takes a HUGE set of balls to pick a player that you know isn’t playing round 1…. To actually play for a donut or 2. Especially with a lot of people playing a 3 rookie ruck set up, they need the cash flow really pumping to get those upgrades done.

But are these boys any better than the rest? Well Neale is loved by the coach but could be a vest specialist. As for the Magnet, he looks DT gold but if he misses a few weeks and Couch takes his upgrade spot and excels where does that leave Mr Magnet? On your team with a big fat zero permanently next to his name. These are only two of the rookies that are causing selection posers.. then we have Hall, we have the tussle between Bugg and Darley for the one spot….. what if you pick the wrong dude? Then there are the premo’s that haven’t shown much in the pre-season… do they even care? Can we still pick them? Hello Zaharakis, Robinson, Beams? Anyone home? Can you pick any of them on faith alone? But those are questions for another week…..

All I want to know is will you wait for Magner and Neale if they don’t play round one? Or will you bang the postwoman?

Hall I’d be inclined to stick with, because there doesn’t look to be that many great forward rookie otions. In the midfield though I think you need guys who are playing round 1. If your players miss the first two rounds, not only are you opening yourself up to donuts, but you’re going to fall behind in terms of cash generation as well.

What? if u put the C on a playing player there is no loophole. You put the vc on a player in the partial lockouts and if they dont score something ur happy with put the C on a different player, ie, swan or ablett. So i will put the vc on martin if he scores 130 or more keep it.

Same with no neck very wary of back injuries im off both for now will consider the magnet anyways shown too much to use trade later sure well hope we will hear more re rookie upgrades soon and loophole is always tempting just for the f**k of it good article yet again adz initially thought it was about Liam j from the headline appreciate your enthusiasm

Friday night was a concern for Zaharakis. Normally I don’t take much notice of premiums in NAB Cup, but I feel for Zaharakis to score 95+ (which he would need to do to be a good pick) he needs to be playing more than half the time in the midfield. On Friday he was stuck in a forward pocket way too much to score those big numbers. Worse than that, there were a lot of midfielders for Essendon that were either injured last year or look to have stepped up like Melksham, Colyer and Winderlich. If Essendon play a full side, Zaha might find himself forward too much.

Browne and Graham won’t play for as long as Maric is fit.
Vickery is now 2nd fwd alongside Jack and will support Maric when needed.

Derickx is backup for Maric, Jack & Vickery. Unlikely to play when all three of those are fit (unless Hardwick wants to go seriously tall up forward) but will get a guernsey before long before Browne or Graham do again, IMO.

Cheers for the update, is my tentative second ruck behind Cox, after I dumped Sandilands and Stephenson for those two. Derickx was monstered by Griffin and Clarke last week, where Redden didn’t seem to have an issue yesterday.

Will probably keep Magner for the moment particularly if Melbourne have 3(!) rookie spots available.

See what you mean but only the 22 on the field contribute to your score and for the sake of the magnet missing 1-2 weeks (fingers crossed and we will know b4 lockout) is monetary value worth the use of a precious trade when he does play cheap as f**k will smash it imo most impressive of pre season rooks im backing the mighty magnet

You pay $85k for someone, its for a reason. They haven’t even been elevated yet and no matter how good their nab cup form may not get more than a handful of partial games all season anyway! For a few bucks more you can get guys like mcdonald, shiels and d.smith which you know will get plenty of game time and score well. If he, couch or gibson does a “curnow” their first couple of games then I’m all ears. I had magnet in my team too but for now he’s lost his magnetic appeal in my squad.

Guess time will tell dont share your confidence re shiel playing round 1 havent seen him yet may prove to be similar conundrum to that of the magnet you may have to wait for him also could both become interesting pod’s if not playing early rounds all speculation at this stage

Response to reprobates by the way is it poss to change emergencies after partial lockout? this would allow you to have magner on field rd1 not scoring and option to switch emg score to another if not much chop..is this correct and need to be quiet or have i missed something?

Cookiemon72, I don’t know enough about the ins and outs of partial lockout to comment. For me, McDonald, Clifton, Miles offer the best value in the mid field for rookies(of those still standing who may play Rd. 1). They will play most weeks and hopefully score well. All very good footy players.

would like those 3 also will prob take punt on 2 of them if named rd 1 bit hesitant of jmac not playing full games but will still make you decent profit at his price and is proven scorer think i have just talked myself into him but must have Miles looks the goods at moment

Much easier for me to have 85k sitting on the pine as opposed to 400k+ bock could well turn into top 6 def for year however and wouldnt be the worst pick imo mtooler im thinking you may drop s thompson??

I mean where peole picked him at the start of the season, thinking “he is certain to get a game soon” and he missed the first 6 or 7 games and by his first price rise you could have downgraded a starting rookie for him.